Local artist Chelsea Ward is the founder and owner of Sketchy Notions, a card and paper goods business that features her own unique creations. Ward grew up in the Santa Ynez Valley, learning art at a young age. She attended the University of Texas in Austin where she learned printmaking and bookmaking and started her first Etsy shop selling her cards and paper designs. She is the creator of Cursive Cursing and has authored two books: Modern Drawing, and Your Year in Art.
Ward recently spoke with the Sun about her business and how her youth in the valley played an influence on her creative path.
Sun: How did you first get involved in art? What drew you to it as a profession?
Ward: I’ve been drawing since preschool. We have drawings I made of my little red schoolhouse I went to from back then. So I’ve always been drawing. The idea of becoming an artist probably developed in middle school. I was a little more geared towards going into fashion but that seemed a little impractical as I got into high school. It was just something I always knew I was going to do and that’s what drew me to it.
Sun: You had a very unique experience at Santa Ynez Valley High School, where you and some other prominent local artists studied under Connie Rohde, the founder of the former C Gallery in Los Alamos. [Rohde retired and the gallery closed in 2017.] What was that like?
Ward: Well we had a community of art people at that school. We were probably kind of the weird kids at school but it didn’t really feel like we were. The art group was very tight-knit. [Rohde] gave us a safe space in a community where we could just be our weird selves. She was definitely an eccentric personality and a lot of us were drawn to that. When you’re an artist you’re drawn to other eccentric people too. She was different and felt like a different person. So it was the right place to be and she encouraged that. She gave us a place to try out our medium and come into our own.
Sun: What drew you to printmaking and book making when you were in college?
Ward: The way UT is set up, you take one class from the four different arts departments there. Printmaking and painting were [grouped together] and I didn’t really want to do oil painting. I took a printmaking class and became obsessed with it. I dove into it head first and later went into woodcutting and lithography after that.
Sun: How did you start your business? What are some of your bestsellers on your website?
Ward: It developed organically. I started the Sketchy Notions name as a blog and then got an Etsy shop with the same name. I went to Italy, and when I came back two years later I started building a website for that. People loved my watercolors and sketchbooks so I tried to turn those into prints for things like birthday cards or congratulatory cards. It’s really grown since then. A lot of the travel postcards sell really well. I’m a crazy succulent lady so a lot of my watercolors incorporate succulents. Mostly my plant-oriented work is what is really popular.
Sun: Looking back on your time as a young artist here, how do you think it is as an incubator for young talent?
Ward: It’s definitely different now that [Rodhe] has retired. The Valley can sometimes be very narrow-minded and small. But those places are sometimes better to explore as a young artist trying different mediums. In a place like this, when you’re pushing the envelope and you push too much you still have a safety net. You have a community that is going to support you afterwards. That’s still in play, even in the high school. It’s a safe place to play in the arts and to push those boundaries. I teach through Arts Outreach, and I see a lot of kids come through there. They are playing through different mediums. They are trying things out. Knowing they can go off to the high school and have that same community is very reassuring to them. They know they will be OK and they will find their own people, other arts kids.
Sun: What, if anything, would you like to see different in the arts community here?
Ward: Definitely more funding. At Arts Outreach [Executive Director Sandy Mullin] is always saying, “In a perfect world, we wouldn’t have a job.” Meaning that in a perfect world, Arts Outreach wouldn’t have to exist. We wouldn’t have to be filling the void trying to give art to kids. The schools would already provide it to them. The schools would have more funding and more teachers, and the teachers would be able to teach those skills to kids on a regular basis.
Arts and Lifestyle Writer Rebecca Rose has some sketchy ideas. Contact her at rrose@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Aug 30 – Sep 6, 2018.